Submerging the I

Whoever wrote that is frankly full of, um, shoes. I love reading first person--I don't recoil when I see all those I's on the page. And I've never heard anyone refer to third person as "thin" or "cowardly."

Just ignore all that questionable advice. Read widely instead of going to writer's workshops, and write what you'd like to read.

Mark Lazer said:

Do you have any thoughts on this technique?

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Switch from first to third person in a story? Hemingaway is the only one I ever read that did that and didn't lose me, though it was still a bit jarring. If you're as good as him, go for it. Otherwise, find another writing clinic/group/site.

Mark Lazer said:

first persion stories have more authority

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No, only the Persion President has authority. That's how they roll in Iran.

Mark,

I remember reading similar advice somewhere, probably in one of my vast number of books on writing. It made sense then, and it still makes sense now (although not the part about switching to second or third, and what is rhetorical second, anyway?).

I don't want to read a first person novel that has "I" "I" "I" "I" "I" did this and that all over the page. I took the advice to mean find another way to say it. Instead of "I walked down the street with my friends," write "We walked to the Coffee Cup for our morning jolt." Or "I saw the sun set, casting its golden hue on the horizon," write "The sun set, a golden orb melting into the horizon."

Not deathless prose, but you get the idea.

I

As long as it isn't taken to extremes, this is very good advice. Getting rid of excessive I's is always good advice, and too many I's can kill the best first person.

Most new writers do go I crazy, and the writing suffers severely. This is one of the reasons most agent and editors shy away from first person writing by new writers.

But the "solution" given takes this to a silly extreme. There's a balance that works, and this solution tips the scales too far the other way.

There is no doubt, however, that too many I's soon gets repeticious, and pretty soon that one little word just seems to jump off the page.

But this is also true in third person. New writers often overuse "he" and "she" just as much as new writers overuse "I" in first person. He did this, and he did that, is no better than I did this, and I did that. It's the same mistake.

Would rhetorical second be something like this?

I ran across the street. You know how you always lose your shoes at the worst possible time? That's what happened when I stepped in the gopher hole.

I disagree on so many levels. I love first person. Most of what I read is in first person because I love the word I. It makes me feel closer to the protagonist, or even like I am the protagonist compared to third person.

However, I do agree that you should try to minimize the number of I's you have in a first person manuscript.

With apologies to Blue Oyster Cult, you should become a "Harvester of I's."

Sounds like the I's have it.

(Sorry. Couldn't resist!)

Mark Lazer said:

Do you have any thoughts on this technique?

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Well Jonny is aware of this technique, but he has generally felt that you ought to be able to pick a particular style to write in, and then stick with it. However, he can see that this can be a useful technique.

He is also aware that a story told in the third-person does grant many more storytelling opportunities, firstly through the use of multiple viewpoint characters, and secondly by enabling the reader to be aware of events that the protagonist is not, thereby (so they say) creating a tension that will drive the story.

But conversely, he finds first-person to have a certain free and familiar style which he feels is absent in third-person. In fact, for certain applications, he thinks third-person can feel downright clumsy, as this post hopefully demonstrates.



Sorry, couldn't resist that.

I did once have a writing tutor set this exercise. Having got us to write some short short, short stories for the first class in the course (I'd started with "My Grandfather's Chess Set" and then wrote a sequel, "The Guy Who Was Into Chess"), in the second class, she then asked us to change them from first to third person.

I had great difficulty changing the second story from first to third, because it was written in a very chatty, almost second person style; and although I did produce a third-person version, I felt it to be vastly inferior to the original.

So I guess what I'm saying is that if you can easily change your first-person prose to third-person, then that perhaps proves that you didn't need to write it in first-person, and thus probably shouldn't. Conversely, if you can't easily change it, then it perhaps indicates that you are taking advantage of some of the extra style opportunities that first-person offers, and thus should leave it in that form.

Then again, when it comes to fiction I'm unpublished, so you should take everything I say with a grain of salt.

Change them to “mine” or “me” or “my.” Or switch to the rhetorical second person or even third person. Just get rid of the I’s.

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That little bit strikes me as silly. If "I" sets our nerves on edge, then so will the possessive/object forms of it (mine, my, me).

As to the rest, I'm of mixed opinion on first person. In some genres it seems to work quite well (especially mysteries, where the reader follows the sleuth in unraveling the puzzle and only knows what the sleuth knows). In others, not so much. Not sure if it's reader expectation or built into the nature of the story.

I've also seen debates (here and elswhere) over whether first person connects more intimately with readers, b/c that's often the reason given for using first person. For myself, as a reader, I find first person is actually distancing, for much the reason given in the quoted advice (not the silly part) -- that someone else saying "I" is a constant reminder that the story is not happening to the reader's "I." In contrast, a reference by an author that "she" is doing something could refer to the reader's "she." (Did that make any sense?) For me, personally, if the writing is good, I tend to bond with the characters more deeply in third person than in first. But that's dependent on two very subjective elements: my own preferences and the writer's skills. A good writer can bond me to his/her characters, regardless of the choice of first person or third.

I really think that one of the best ways of figuring out whether to write in first or third is to look at the books you read. If you read a lot of first person, and you like first person, then you may well want to write first person. If you virtually never read first person, then why would you expect your own audience to read first person?

JD

JanDarby said:

I really think that one of the best ways of figuring out whether to write in first or third is to look at the books you read. If you read a lot of first person, and you like first person, then you may well want to write first person. If you virtually never read first person, then why would you expect your own audience to read first person?

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That sounds like excellent advice! The old principle of "write what you know", but applied to style rather than the usual genre.

I'll have to go home and start looking through all my favourite books.

authority

Imelda said:

First person has no more authority than third. James N. Frey proves it very well in 'How To Write Damn Good Fiction' (excellent book) by doing the same passage twice.

However, you are right about too many 'I's. I think first person is far harder to write interestingly, than third person, for that very reason. It really bugs me when instructors tell newbie writers to use first person to make it 'more immediate' because there's a very delicate balance that's difficult to achieve.

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James N. Frey aside, first person absolutely has more closeness than third, and this is what is usually meant by authority. It's all a matter of how far the narratoir is from the story, and you can't have a narrator closer than the one in first person. Nor can you tell anything at all about either first or third by rewriting a single passage. It's just odd to think you can.

That's just a real lack of knowledge about what first person is supposed to do. First person doesn't work this way, and Frey should have known it. The fact that he tried tells me he never writes first person, because "authority" in the sense that he talks about isn't the issue, and no one can tell anything by rewriting a single passage.

When done right, first person IS more immediate, and first person Does place the narrator closer to the POV character than is possible in any other POV simply because it's the only POV where the narrator and POV character are one and the same.

Jamesaritchie said:

But this is also true in third person. New writers often overuse "he" and "she" just as much as new writers overuse "I" in first person. He did this, and he did that, is no better than I did this, and I did that. It's the same mistake.

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This is something I worry about. Is it possible to elaborate on this with a general rule, or is this just something you have to figure out yourself?

I mean, how else do you say people are doing things without writing that they're doing it?

You just don't need to specify the pronoun for the narrator in most sentences. For example, in most instances, you don't need to say "I heard the car screech around the corner." "The car screeched around the corner" will suffice. If you're narrating in first person, the reader knows who heard the car.

caw.

Yeah, I get that, but I was more referring to the third person. The overuse of "he" and "she". How do you cut that down without reverting to passive sentences?

blacbird said:

You just don't need to specify the pronoun for the narrator in most sentences. For example, in most instances, you don't need to say "I heard the car screech around the corner." "The car screeched around the corner" will suffice. If you're narrating in first person, the reader knows who heard the car.

caw.

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I agree. Ishmael vanishes completely for chapters on end in Moby Dick.

99% of filtering such as "I heard the car screech" or "I saw her walking toward me" or "I found myself humming a song" can be taken out. What is hard to do is action. If your book is heavy on action, the "I" is inevitable and you shouldn't try to deliberately get rid of it. To me, that's just artificial. After all, first person narrative is kind of conversational, and there's nothing wrong with saying "I did this and that." People say things like "I flew to Paris that weekend..." If you're merely observing the outside world, then the "I" can gladly disappear.